Mr PEDERICK (Hammond) (16:43): Today I rise to discuss the Passenger Transport (Point to Point Transport Services) Amendment Bill 2025, which was introduced by the Minister for Infrastructure and Transport on 5 February 2025.

The government had an election commitment as part of their 2022 campaign, which was to initiate a review of the Passenger Transport Act. In August 2024, the government released 29 recommendations detailing proposed changes to the legislative framework that regulates taxis, rideshare and chauffeur vehicles.

The speech the minister made focused on safety, compliance and vehicle authorisation standards and these are certainly very important considerations. The bill also includes the removal of independent oversight and significantly expanded ministerial authority and discretion. The bill certainly does propose significant reforms to South Australia's point-to-point transport industry, impacting taxis, rideshare and chauffeur services. The government claims the bill is necessary to modernise the industry and implement elements of the taxi industry support package from the 2024-25 state budget.

There are significant concerns regarding the bill's removal of independent oversight and the significant increase in ministerial authority. This bill also proposes to open up all of South Australia to rideshare operators, which I truly welcome. The current metropolitan boundary, which has expanded over time, has now reached the southern edge of Mount Barker, but it has been very restrictive. It restricts where point-to-point services can operate, limiting passenger transport options for customers outside the Adelaide metropolitan area. The bill will allow for rideshare to operate across South Australia in both metropolitan and regional areas.

Just on that point, it is interesting to note we have been the only state in Australia to have a metropolitan boundary in place. All the rest of the states operate under one licence that can be operated across the whole state. For instance, you could have Sydney Uber drivers working in Sydney most of the time and they might go up the north coast of New South Wales during the summer and they do not need another licence; they just use the licence that they already have to operate during the summertime to capitalise on their licence. That only seems like common sense and it seems quite an oddity to say the least that there was this boundary disruption here in South Australia, because obviously operators did not want to have to go through the pain of having two licences, which just seemed ridiculous from day one, so hopefully this will iron all of that out.

Myself, the member for Schubert and other members on this side have advocated for this across our electorates. Regional communities and councils are very supportive of this change and Uber have flagged that setting up in the regions will take time to onboard drivers and ensure capacity before rolling out.

Regional taxi operators have flagged concern with this change, highlighting issues around busy summertimes being attractive to rideshare operators and vacating the regions during slower months. I have a different view. As it does in the city, I think across regional South Australia there are plenty of options where taxi services can work directly alongside Uber. With towns like Strathalbyn and Murray Bridge there is so much opportunity for these services to expand, because quite frankly there are next to no other services. There is a local dial-a-ride service in Murray Bridge, but there is no real public transport service in either town that is regular and connects to other towns. There is certainly no Metroticket, which would be most welcome in both areas to connect to the urban network.

For several years now I have been advocating on behalf of those local communities, especially with regard to the opportunities we have in the Murraylands and the Langhorne Creek wine district and areas surrounding these areas. As people have seen, we have that much opportunity with the wineries of Langhorne Creek. Some of these are hosting wedding events and other major events—we have Woodburn Homestead, outside of Langhorne Creek, which is a fantastic setting for weddings and other events—and there are so many other things that happen in the Langhorne Creek and Strathalbyn area. There are car runs and motorbike runs, but people just come out to enjoy the area, and the whole group want to enjoy the area, so something like Uber opening up will be more than welcome.

In the Murray Bridge/Murraylands region there are so many things happening. We see the Monarto Safari Park going from strength to strength with the new motel getting a new operator signed up—Journey Beyond, the train operators—who are going to take over the management of the safari park built by Gerry Ryan from Jayco. We really appreciate his investment into the safari park. There will be 78 rooms there and also 20 glamping tents where you can stay amongst the lions. I am sure there will be at least a little bit of fencing between you and the lions and all the other animals that are in the park. Elaine Bensted knows my passion for elephants, and we have finally got a couple of elephants at Monarto Safari Park, and we have three more coming. So I applaud all the activities at Monarto Safari Park. That is one place in my area that is really booming and where rideshare services could be utilised for access.

We have a lot of racing events in our local community. We have the speedway, we have go-karts and then further down the road, at Tailem Bend obviously, we have the Motorsport Park which is being well utilised every weekend for various events. Now, with the onset of the drags opening up there, after a long time—decades—without the opportunity for drag racing in Tailem Bend, it is so good to see that opportunity being taken up.

Right across the board, people could be visiting to utilise water sports, water activities on the river—which many do, obviously—so I think there is so much opportunity. Some people say, especially in the taxi industry, 'With Uber coming along it will cause too much disruption and put us out of work.' Well, I think there is lots of opportunity, especially on weekends, and this is where perhaps part-time drivers who have a full-time job or a nearly full-time job could operate on Friday and Saturday nights, because it is certainly needed, to pick up people from venues like the local hotels or wineries and get them home.

I know one of the cab services is looking at doubling their cabs into Murray Bridge and surrounding areas, so I think there will be a great uplift as Uber comes in and, yes, it will take time. I think there are thoughts that this could be activated for Gather Round, and hopefully it can be. Gather Round is not that far down the track; less than two months away. As Uber have stated, they need to onboard drivers, get people to go through all the compliance protocols that they need to do to get onboard to open up this opportunity throughout the regions. I think it will be exciting, and I think it is a real opportunity so long as it is managed appropriately, gets off the ground appropriately, and just works hopefully seamlessly.

That might be asking for too much because there are times when things do not happen seamlessly, depending on what the issue is. But there is a real opportunity to open up regions right across this state, especially for those who are not that far from Adelaide, and I think there is a real bonus that we could be looking at here in tourism across the regions and right across the state.

At the moment, there is the Passenger Transport Standards Committee, which is the body responsible for overseeing passenger transport standards, compliance and regulations. This committee ensures industry consultation, provides oversight on regulatory matters and acts as an independent advisory group to balance industry needs with government policy. This section of the current act will be repealed and the minister will not have a committee. Instead, all references to the committee will be transferred to ministerial authority. This means that all the regulatory oversight, industry consultation and standard-setting functions that were previously undertaken by the committee will now solely fall to the minister's discretion. In regard to internal review mechanisms, instead of going to the District Court these appeals will go to SACAT and that will come in with the new ministerial powers.

There have been some concerns raised about transparency and accountability with this change and some are suggesting that without the independent body to review and guide the regulations, industry participants, including people from right across the board, whether they are taxi operators, rideshare services or chauffeur companies, will have no formal mechanism to challenge or contribute to regulatory decisions. The Taxi Council are concerned that it will effectively make the minister, or his delegate, the judge, jury and executioner. As I have said, this does centralise the power in the minister's hands. We just need to make sure that, moving forward, this is used effectively to manage the industry in a positive way.

In regard to concerns about total ministerial control, there was broad agreement between both the Department for Infrastructure and Transport and the Taxi Council that the committee, which will become obsolete if this legislation is passed, has been relatively ineffective, dealing with rather trivial administrative issues and hands out insignificant fines for breaches. It is acknowledged that they believe the operations are opaque and that it is a time-consuming process for the department to prepare briefs for the committee to take action, even when CCTV footage of wrongdoing exists.

Certainly, in regard to the bill, the minister gets discretion over accreditation and licensing. Also, it places all the accreditation decisions under direct ministerial control, affecting booking service providers, general passenger transport services and individual drivers. That is taken over in various sections throughout the bill.

There is also part of the bill that has regard to the buyback scheme for taxi licences, which has obviously been an ongoing issue over many years, which offers $200,000 for the first metropolitan taxi licence and $10,000 for additional licences up to a total of six. This is obviously well below, in some places, what many operators originally paid for those licences. We are thinking that the proposed eight-year timeframe for buybacks is too long, leaving some licence holders still paying for loans when taxi licences were in excess of $300,000. Hopefully, there may be a restriction in that timeline to get these licences paid back.

In saying all that, the Taxi Council certainly do not want any delay. They have operators who, for a range of reasons, want to get out of the industry and they want the timeline reduced down to four years, if possible. There is a whole range of timelines around that, and then this bill takes out the requirement for perpetual taxi licences and replaces them with an uncapped annual licensing system. The legislation itself does not specify the exact cost of an annual taxi licence; this is something else that is under the discretion of the minister.

There has been consultation with Uber Australia and the Taxi Council of South Australia. Generally, apart from some in the taxi industry feeling they are over a barrel, they are keen for the legislation to get going and to just get on with it. Uber are keen to get on with the job. I have had different meetings with Uber; some have been on Teams. It will be a great thing to see extra options coming to communities from across the board, but it certainly will need a lot of time to onboard this new program. Obviously, you will need people to be involved and Uber drivers to be involved. They will need to be accredited and registered to offer those opportunities.

As I said, with the weekend opportunities in regional areas from Friday through to Sunday night and over long weekends as well, I think there is a huge opportunity with the number of entertainment options and functions that happen in the regions—such as across mine in the Murraylands and the beautiful wine region of Langhorne Creek—for point-to-point transport to prosper alongside the taxi industry so that people have a lot more options and a lot more flexibility when they are going out for entertainment and for work purposes as well. I know there will be some questions asked later on, but with those words I support the bill.